Married but want to have other relationships

[mumofteens]

Please be gentle with me!! I have been married for ages and have teenage children. My husband is a very good friend and we get on well. I am very fond of him. But I don't really fancy him. If I am honest I think I find him a comforting father type of figure (my own father was crap). I would rather not have sex with him at all. However, I would like to have emotional/sexual relationships with other men. I nearly had an affair when my children were younger as I "fell in love" with someone who also had strong feelings for me. I was going to start an affair, but then I discovered I was pregnant. I was in an emotional turmoil but decided to make a go on my marriage and never embarked on the affair. Now I find myself with strong feelings for someone else. I want freedom! But I can't bear the thought of the dishonesty of an affair or the turmoil of a divorce. Help!! I can't bear the emotional turmoil any more.

But surely he wants to be with someone who finds him desirable sexually? He is very attractive - he would be snapped up. I even have someone in mind who I want him to fall in love with - she is perfect for him, absolutely perfect. I am planning a dinner party and hoping they will fall in love. I know this sounds completely mad.

What could happen? Husband falls in love. My crush comes to nothing whatsoever. I don't find love with anyone else. Gorgeous husband (who I just don't happen to fancy that much but everything else is great) lives happily ever after with perfect new woman who also fancies him!!

Serve me right. Perhaps I will start writing romantic fiction instead and just stay in passionless but otherwise okay marriage.

Thanks for the moralising - I have actually been married for 18 years so I do know something about it you know.

But then perhaps you are perfect, are you? Or do you always make judgements on people you don't know?

Childish projection.

I feel for you both tbh.

I agree with TMMJ.
Marriage isn't something that gets good and stays good all by itself. It does take work and compromise on both sides. You do sound self absorbed and immature. Your posts are all about you, what you want, and what you don't want. You don't really seem to have any real consideration for your poor husband at all.

You have said he is shocked and upset and yet then you tell us you have already picked out the person YOU want him to fall in love with. HOW DARE YOU! Not only are you quite happy to screw up his life by telling him that you want to sleep with other people, but you even think it is ok to control who he falls in love with next!

Previously you saked whether marriage was a life sentence and why being married should prevent you from sleeping with someone else. You appeared to justify it by saying that other people do it. Well, marriage is not a life sentence, but it is (usually) entered into as a life long commitment. When I got married I promised to stay married until death do us part. I also promised to remain faithful to my husband 'as long as we both shall live'. I am not saying that marriages and relationships don't break down. of course they do, and often because one of the partners has chosen not to honour the promises they made when they got married. I do not condemn those whose marriages fail, because I have seen how hard it is for everyone in such a situation. I do however, believe that if you are no longer willing to have a full and exclusive relationship with your husband, and if he is not entirely happy to indulge your wishes regarding other relationships, then it is your responsibility to put an end to the situation by separating and allowing him the opportunity to build a new relationship with the woman OF HIS CHOICE.

Both of you are moralising and judgemental. I have been considering everyone eveyone's needs but my own for 18 years. Now I am going to start considering my own needs. Husband has always considered his own needs.

I am slightly tongue in cheek about the woman I want him to fall in love with...you know a little bit of irony...come on life is a bit of a bitch, better have a laugh about it.

Listen - there is stuff husband hasn't told me. It's starting to come out. There is another side to the story.

Mumofteens, have read from the start and good for you I say. You could have just started an affair but you didnt. Am amazed at all the 'but your vows, do they mean nothing' comments. Was well commented on by others so I would add as I wouldnt be as eloquent. Look forward to how your situation unfolds. You've given 18 years of your life and I dont think your posts come across as selfcentered at all.

Good luck to you I say.

has he really. with the greatest respect you asked for opinions on a controversial topic from a huge breadth of women. You started the controversy so whilst i too think you sound slightly insane talking about setting your husband up - yes wouldnt that just absolve you of guilt totally - i do think you need to stop attacking and accusing the people replying to you. You wanted opinions, you opened yourself up to a number of people who have been in both your dh's and your position and as a result you are getting both sides of the coin. The people who furiously question your morality are the same as the people who will do it in rl if you have an affair. I think you need to stop posting self justification for an idea you have already decided on and either sort some councelling to decide what you want to do or leave your husband now. Its fine to examine your feelings on the subject on a forum like this which you have done but if you expect full permission to cheat from the women here - think again.

I don't think anyone has been particularly harsh on the OP. They have said they don't agree and why - if the OP doesn't like the responses then that is tough. Ask for opinions and you will get two sides.

FWIW I think the OP is wrong to consider an afffair whilst married.

It surely has to always be wrong to have an affair whilst in a marriage (or any relationship TBH), knowing that those actions will hurt the other party.

The OP asks it clear that her husband would be upset by her thoughts, let alone if she went through with it. So, if she is really a friend to him, even if not in love with him, she shoudl respect him and not do something that will hurt him when (and it is when, not if) he finds out.

If the OP wants a new relationship, or even just sex with another person, then she should end her current relationship.

How can anything else be right?

(The OP makes it clear that the non-monogamous thing is not mutual between both parties remember)

Just seen update. I am glad you hav now spoken to your husband. I hope all goes well, and you both find happiness in some way or other.

really sorry but this has to be a laugh, surely? can't help but feel incredibly sorry for both MoT and her DH. what a situation to be in when the way out is clear? although clearly not to some. i do like the way she accuses people of being moralising and judgmental. it's not moralising and judgmental it's having standards and principles. and empathy with others. 18yrs of marriage and it's meant to be always rough-and-ready blow-your-socks-off sex mills and boon style? i think the world is a little rose-tinted there. it is hard graft, but if you love someone it is worth it, isn't it? loving is difficult, and not always overtly appreciated by either party, but i think - i think the marriage thing is about unconditional love. loving someone in their entirety for as long as you both shall live. loving may not mean being in love all the time, it is the state of love itself. we do it with our children (if we're good people) without thinking, why is it so hard to do it with our spouses? why does it have to be a competition to see who can 'stick it out the most' and who can 'martyr' themselves?

to be frank, if i haven't been already, you really need to buck your ideas up and start that counselling, which, being counselling, will involve lots of money and mainly whining about how hard you've had it and the reply will be 'yes, you have why not book x number of sessions and we can explore it further at your expense?'.

be honest and end it. your children will surprising thankyou for it. and your husband might get a better deal next time round. and you can start finding someone to share your misery life with.

Rubbish most of the last responses. We have a long friendship and our children benefit from our long partnership - warts and all. The idea that divorce is okay - sorry but what about the marriage vows - but an affair is completely unacceptable is totally contradictory. We have a family unit that is good and is worth preserving - yes, we both have other stuff to deal with but who doesn't? Just getting divorced doesn't deal with all the stuff - and it doesn't help our children either - or us.

hang about miss contrary, but who has just spent most of her thread saying that the marriage vows weren't the be all and all of marriage? seems a load of old bull to then turn around and say marriage vows pick and choose 'em. an affair is not acceptable in marriage. it really isn't, whatever self justification you can come up with. if you have an affair, then why not have a divorce? to say that they are both mutually exclusive is ridiculous. there is one that is honest and one that isn't.

do you know i think you should go have an affair. go have an affair, tell your husband, cos he'll find out anyway, then make the mistake of falling in love (as you'll see it) go through lots of guilt, watch as your children see you as unprincipled, and no doubt mess them up, and ultimately...well, ten to one you'll get divorced in the end anyway. and no, that isn't a true story in case you think i am projecting.

whatever anyone says on here, you have made up your mind about the matter anyway. its just a question of who the poor s.o.d is going to be.

So hang on - after all the talk about needing to look outside, being bored, not sexually attracted etc etc and your husband also having issues now your friends and want to stay married.

If you had come on here and suggested that you had lost your attraction to your husband and wanted to stay with him but did anyone have any experience or suggestions of how to cope with the doldrums in a marriage i would have had total sympathy because after eighteen years i could understand how the spark would go out and some fresh approaches required but you didnt.

You seem hell bent on contradicting not only yourself but everyone else on here and being as inflammatory as possible - dont even begin to talk about vows being broken when you want your husband to fall in love with someone else and are trying to set it up.I believe one vow is "to forsake all others" - so you want to stay together unless he meets someone else???????? Quite frankly i think your as mad as a hatter and wasting not only the time of the people giving you valid opinions of adultery and divorce but also the people supporting you and trying to rationalise your point of view. Stop wasting everyones time, go to anne summers, stay married and give it a rest - you didnt want opinions, you wanted to come across as a victim and a sexually liberated freedom butterfly. You have succeeded in coming across as arrogant, selfish and quite frankly self absorbed - you upset your husband last night by telling him what you wanted - which hurt him FROM WHAT YOU SAID.
Get over yourself and create a blog but stop wasting everyones time with this crap.

Pretty fly flounces off.

Get over yourself. Sadly, I don't value your opinion. Anyone who really is open to thinking about difficult issues (including my husband) actually listens to what people are saying and
does not form a judgement at all. Yes - what a good model for dealing with human relationships. We are talking so much - a lot of it is very difficult and confronts very difficult issue but neither of us it blaming the other. Yes, we are moving to a more honest level of communication. It is all good - if quite painful.
Who knows where it will go - who knows cares?

quick question - if you don't value opinion, why ask for it? you make a valid point when you say 'anyone who really is open to thinking about difficult issues...actually listens to what people are saying'. good words, shame you don't seem to act on them. you don't have to be on the defensive when all the forum are giving their opinion, which you have invited (knowingly or not). i hope that you do actually listen to what your husband says, and that he listens to you also.

Is your husband too ugly to sleep with but too wealthy to leave?

Please also consider your children in all this. They are teenagers, you say, so old enough to understand when something is going on, but still young enough to judge very much in black and white. In 2 relationships I know where the mother had an affair and subsequently hurt the father, the children (teenagers) were hugely judgemental of the mother (even more so than many of us MN's!) and in a couple of cases it has led to a complete breakdown in the child-mother relationship- where before this happened you would have said child and mother were very close. You can't expect teenagers to have empathy with your situation, so steel yourself for the fallout if you decide to practice deceit. You are not just deceiving your DH, you are also deceiving your kids.

More judgements - listen folks - start discussing, negotiating, listening, etc rather than setting your agendas.

Me and hubby - talking lots - it is all good stuff. Painful but good.

whoaa there pal, is that first sentence a reflection of what you are doing? what you want to do? or what you believe we're doing?

hope people don't mind me saying but what agenda's could mumsnet have in setting for you and your dh?

bit odd really. listen first, ask questions, think things through and then do what needs doing. whatever that is.

glad you and your hubby are talking at last. perhaps this thread has run its course then?

Erm- I really don't have "an agenda"! TBH, I have no emotional investment in your private life, not really very sure what we are meant to be negotiating??? I was only asking if you had considered your kids feelings, and sharing some experience, can't see how that is a "judgement". But you seem impervious to anyone else's thoughts/ ideas/ experiences, and I don't feel like being patronised by you any more! Have to say, your narcissism takes my breath away!

tell you what. we all agree with everything you say. you are totally right. we feel very sorry for you and completely agree with all of your perspectives.

thread finished.